CAPITOL HILL - A U.S. Senate hearing has further exposed tensions between lawmakers and the Obama administration about international negotiations to limit Iran's nuclear program. U.S. officials sought to reassure skeptical legislators of both parties that diplomacy can succeed, and that Iran will be amply punished if it fails.

U.S. officials at the Senate hearing

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez wanted to know if a final accord with Iran would freeze its ability to make a nuclear weapon or eliminate it entirely.

"A final agreement that mothballs [halts] Iran's [nuclear] infrastructure, but preserves their ability to easily break out [become a nuclear-armed nation] is not a final agreement I can support," he said.

Menendez has crafted a bill spelling out additional sanctions against Iran if talks break down. The measure has put him in conflict with fellow-Democrat President Barack Obama, who has pledged to veto any measure that could torpedo negotiations. Menendez feared Iran would wriggle free of sanctions while retaining its nuclear weapons capacity.

"We need to guard against wanting a deal so much that we concede more than we gain. At the end of the day, Iran can no longer be a nuclear weapons-threshold state," he said.

Other senators were more blunt. Republican James Risch called the interim nuclear agreement a "disaster" and said he was "disgusted" by limited sanctions relief for Iran.

"You have got business people flooding in there, ready to do business [with Iran], going back to business as usual with the Iranians," he said. "Whose job is it going to be to put the genie back in the bottle [restart sanctions] when this thing [diplomacy] fails?"

Appearing before the committee, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman stressed that no final accord would be soft on Tehran.

"We remain in control over whether to accept the terms of a final deal or not," she said. "We have made it clear to Iran that if it fails to live up to its commitments, or if we are unable to reach agreement on a comprehensive solution, we would ask Congress to ramp up new sanctions immediately."

Several senators expressed concern if the time it took to enact new sanctions Iran could accelerate its nuclear program. U.S. Treasury Under Secretary David Cohen responded that the economic relief Tehran currently enjoys was small and reversible.

"If Iran fails to meet its commitments under the joint plan, we can revoke this limited sanctions relief and, at a minimum, reinstate the suspended sanctions," he said.

Not all senators are equally pessimistic about diplomacy with Iran. Democratic Senator Tim Kaine said he was prepared to vote for military action, if needed, to keep Iran nuclear weapons free. But he argued for a good-faith pursuit of diplomacy before drastic measures are contemplated.

- The year of 2014 is starting well for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the premier organization of this country's Israel lobby. Not only has it been clearly and increasingly decisively defeated - at least for now and the immediate future - in its bid to persuade a filibuster-proof, let alone a veto-proof, super-majority of senators to approve the Kirk-Menendez "Wag the Dog" Act that was designed to torpedo the Nov. 24 "Joint Plan of Action" (JPA) between Iran and the P5+1... -Jim Lobe - 2/1/14

- The subtitle of Gareth Porter's new book, The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare, is well-chosen. Large parts of A Manufactured Crisis are indeed untold till now. They amount to what the author terms an "alternative narrative". But don't be misled by "alternative". This is not the work of some crank who imagines conspiracies where none exist. -Peter Jenkins, LobeLog - 1/30/14

- Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) claims that it has U.S. national security interests at heart, but it's difficult to understand how U.S. backing for an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities will serve U.S. national interests if negotiators are still trying to work out the details of a final agreement six months from now. -Jim Lobe - 1/29/14

- The front-page article by Jodi Rudoren about Israel's "Castle Strategy" in Sunday's New York Times offers yet one more example - and right in the opening paragraph - of why the Kirk-Menendez "Wag the Dog" Act of 2013 is so dangerous to the security of the United States. -Jim Lobe - 1/21/14

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- The US faces a grave crisis. One threatening our economic well-being and modern political system. We seem destined for a ruinous enemy deficit. If President Barack Obama has his way, Iran and America, after 35 years of enmity, may be headed for reconciliation, a serious diminution of tensions, an end to constant blustering, proxy conflicts and freely flowing bile. -Henry Precht - 1/16/14

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- Tuesday's floor speech by Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein could bury AIPAC's hopes of winning passage of what I have called the Kirk-Menendez Wag the Dog Act of 2013...at least for the next month or so. -Jim Lobe - 1/15/14

- Sixty-two organizations delivered a joint letter to the Senate today urging the Senate to oppose new Iran sanctions legislation, S.1881, that they say would "critically endanger the possibility of a diplomatic resolution to the nuclear standoff with Iran, increasing the likelihood of a nuclear-armed Iran and an unnecessary and costly war." - 1/14/14

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